Personal accountability is the only way out of the deepening PED swamp. Nonito Donaire understands that. Few do.

Donaire was proactive in addressing suspicions he knew would be there when he hired Victor Conte, the BALCO founder who spent four years in prison for his role in the scheme to distribute performance enhancers to Olympic medalists and major leaguers who rewrote baseball’s home-run records. Donaire took the test, takes the test, whenever and wherever.

It’s unfortunate that Juan Manuel Marquez didn’t follow Donaire’s lead. If Marquez had, there wouldn’t be all of those messy questions attached to his dramatic victory last Saturday over Manny Pacquiao at Las Vegas’ MGM Grand. Marquez’ home-run shot in the sixth round knocked out Pacquiao, but none of the PED garbage.

Not taking an Olympic-style test these days is the equivalent of taking the fifth. It’s just another way of saying you don’t want to incriminate yourself.

Marquez likes to call himself an intelligent fighter. But he didn’t think things through when he first hired Angel Heredia, a former Conte associate, and then added muscle to a middle-aged body that Heredia christened “The Hulk.” Heredia and Conte will be in opposite corners Saturday night at Houston’s Toyota Center. Heredia works for Jorge Arce, who fights Donaire for the super-bantamweight title.

Heredia, like Conte, is bound to stir up suspicions. Before his upset of Pacquiao, Marquez said he was willing to undergo testing considered more thorough and rigorous than the procedure administered by the Nevada State Athletic Commission.

Saying it, however, isn’t doing it.

Marquez didn’t.

Instead, he underwent Nevada tests that many believe are easy to circumvent. The Nevada tests will come up clean, Marquez said. It would be a huge upset if they didn’t. In the court of public opinion, however, the negative result won’t allay the suspicions.

During the last year, we have heard testimony and watched news reports of how Lance Armstrong beat the system in international cycling for years. Armstrong always denied doping. He still does. But few believe him. That public skepticism has spread to every fighter who won’t step up and undergo state-of-the-art testing not required by state regulators.

Heredia’s well-documented role with BALCO includes grand-jury testimony in which he says he supplied Olympic track-and-field medalist Marion Jones with performance enhancers. Jones, a woman and the only athlete sentenced to jail in the BALCO scandal, never tested positive. She always denied the allegations. In the end, she was convicted on a perjury charge.

I want to believe Marquez and so do many of my friends. I respect him, his poise and ability to think through a tough fight. Marquez’ physical transformation, Heredia says, is about “science.’’ Maybe so. But wasn’t Frankenstein science fiction?

It’s the fiction part that bothers me. Only updated testing can make it real and that’s a process that starts with the kind of accountability practiced by Donaire.

LAS VEGAS – The keyboard of this laptop is covered in papery brown pistachio skins and shell dust. There’s a black plastic bag of Wonderful Pistachios just to the left, one of hundreds placed along press row before Saturday’s card, in what passes for swag in this eroding business. Wonderful Pistachios were Filipino congressman Manny Pacquiao’s latest marketing hustle, the tasty green nuts he whacked from a speedbag swivel hook in countless loops on the screen above Saturday’s ring.

There’s no occasion for reading creatively yet, the metaphor is right here: After what Juan Manuel Marquez did to him in the final second of the sixth round of their fourth fight, Pacquiao’s career is now in as many pieces, and filled with as much promise, as the pistachios that coat this keyboard. “Marquez KO 6” – their fight’s official line – hardly approaches it. Pacquiao will fight on, partially out of pride, partially out of financial necessity, but mostly because he’s the one person who was in MGM Grand Garden Arena that holds no recollection of what was done to him Saturday.

It was Juan Manuel Marquez’s night, the crowning act of vindication in a late career marked by its spiteful pursuit, but the entire spectacle felt more like a treatment of Manny Pacquiao. The comatose posture on the apron, his head under the bottom rope, his body perfectly still, his hands folded passively and unnaturally beneath him – testifying to a brain’s communication severed well before it could recognize, much less send notification, his face was in a freefall to cover each of the 66 inches between his metallic blue boots and raven hair.

Folded is how Pacquiao looked, tidied up and put away, resting peacefully in an oblivious place that might be sweet were it not for the vehicle that transported him there, and were it not for the masses of instantly aghast witnesses – some soon appalled, others quickly euphoric, but all initially aghast because it is nigh impossible for a person not to start at the sight of his own put temporarily in a place so like death.

There was not a seat on press row from which anything but Pacquiao’s back could be seen. One heard the clapper signal 10 seconds and began the countdown to round’s end. Surely a few scribes, and cornermen, lowered their heads to begin all the thoughts and activities that happen in the in-between minutes of championship prizefights. Pacquiao had won the round and was about to be up two points on all three judges’ scorecards – identical after five – at the midway point of a fight already featuring two knockdowns and more brutality than its trilogy of predecessors, as neither man desired judges’ opining this time, each stating plainly beforehand he preferred exactly the unconsciousness Pacquiao got to another official decision.

The very maneuver Pacquiao used to fell Marquez three times in the first round of their first match in 2004 – feinted left-hand lead, backwards hop, forwards leap, committed left hand – brought the violent end of their tetralogy. For Marquez made an adjustment that betrayed his newfound confidence in a right hand that was ever accurate but is now prodigious. Marquez used a leftwards spin to thwart Pacquiao’s signature combo in the concluding 11 rounds of their first match, a left-hook lead to Pacquiao’s right shoulder to thwart it in their second match, and a feint of his own in their rubber match; but Saturday brought a seeing-eye right hand Marquez threw because for the first time in his career’s 125 minutes and 59 seconds of fighting Pacquiao, Marquez, boxing’s best gambler, a natural-born predator, calculated the risk ratio favored him.

Pacquiao did not sense it at all; he leaped in with the left-hand lead because he knew the worst that would come was a trip over Marquez’s front shoulder, and the best that might come was a definitive end to their rivalry – shutting “Dinamita’s” crybaby mouth for the rest of their days. Pacquiao did not walk into Marquez’s right hand or even run into it. Pacquiao bounded at it, got his upper vertebrae contracted by it, his chin forced backwards while the rest of him surged forwards, and ruined by it.

There was something different about Marquez’s right hand Saturday. What made Saturday’s first knockdown so stunning in round 3, when a looping right hand from Marquez, one that traveled in an arc enough for Pacquiao to track it, knocked Pacquiao straight backwards, was that everyone watched it arrive, including Pacquiao. The punch disrupted the competitors’ pattern; it arrived either quicker or harder than anything Pacquaio’d been hit with in 13 years. And before Saturday, was Marquez known for wearing one-punch chloroform on his right glove at welterweight?

There will be allegations aplenty this week about Marquez’s historic transformation from balletic 125-pound counterpuncher to 143-pound powerpunching freak, delts bulged and lats shredded and biceps pronouncedly vascular, a transformation that came, absurdly and audaciously, after his 38th birthday, and so, two thoughts: Juan Manuel Marquez did not cheat – his negative drug test will confirm that – but the recipe for his strength and conditioning coach’s cocktail of supplements should be confiscated under a clause that reads: “Whatever chemistry transforms a professional athlete’s body the way yours did must not be tolerated henceforth.”

This too: If Marquez knew next week would bring a positive PED test but not erase from memory his moment of vindication, his instant of euphoria at seeing dissolved the man he believes delayed his proper coronation for almost a decade, a recorded sensation of Pacquiao’s head giving way like a pillow to the middle knuckle of his right fist, followed by a snapshot of Pacquiao’s limp motionless body folded on the blue apron right beside the white ‘k’ in Top Rank, Marquez would take it, so help him God, he would.

Bart Barry can be reached at bart.barrys.email (at) gmail.com

LAS VEGAS – An era came crashing down, face first. Jinkee Pacquiao cried. Her husband couldn’t. Manny Pacquiao was unconscious. After the smelling salts were applied and he awakened, he smiled. He might have been the only Filipino in the world to smile then, now and perhaps for a very long time. The Philippines could only weep.

But there might have been some relief in the Pacquiao smile.

Finally, he can move on.

Finally, he can get on with his political career.

Finally, he doesn’t have to answer any more questions about Floyd Mayweather, Jr., and the media doesn’t have to ask them.

Time to turn the page.

But it’s up to him.

After his collision with Juan Manuel Marquez’ right hand Saturday night in the final second of the sixth round of the fourth chapter of their rivalry at the MGM Grand, Pacquiao wasn’t ready to step out of the ropes for good and into a full time career in the political ring.

“I’m going to take a rest and come back,’’ Pacquiao said after Marquez beat for the first time.

He might re-think that tomorrow or next week or next year. A review of the stunning stoppage on video might do a lot to convince him that a fifth fight with Marquez isn’t worth the risk. While the predominately Mexican crowd danced and sang in celebration of Marquez decisive victory, Pacquiao talked about a fifth fight.

“Why not, if the promoters can make it?’’ he said.

Pacquiao promoter Bob Arum echoed the why-not. A live gate of more than $10 million is a pretty good reason to do some more business.

But Pacquiao wore a T-shirt that, unwittingly perhaps, summed it up. Finished Business, it said. It was supposed to be a message about a rivalry that he finished. Instead, it could have said it all for his brilliant career.

Marquez, who had a knockdown scored against him when his left hand hit the canvas from a jarring left in the fifth, foresaw a chance to knock out Pacquiao.

“He was coming in and I felt that I could hit him with a perfect punch,’’ said Marquez, who also knocked down Pacquiao in the third.

That punch landed at a moment when Pacquiao never saw it. His trainer, Freddie Roach, said he got careless, which is another way of saying it time to think about retirement.

Before the bout, Pacquiao got a visit in his dressing room from Mitt Romney, who wanted to be president and failed in U.S. elections last month. Roach, Arum and others in Pacquiao’s entourage have often said the Filipino Congressman has aspirations to be president of his own country.

He might have better chance that than at winning a fifth over Marquez.

LAS VEGAS – The definitive end of the Manny Pacquiao Era came Saturday. It came in an act of sudden, precise violence. And it came from the right fist of Pacquiao’s nemesis, Mexican Juan Manuel Marquez.

In the sixth round of their fourth fight, in the closing second of it in fact, Marquez used Pacquiao’s feint as his trigger, planted his weight, and threw a short right hand with years of frustration behind it. The punch landed purely, forced Pacquiao’s chin to his right collarbone, and rendered the Filipino entirely unconscious before he landed face-first on the apron. No 10-count was necessary.

The official time of Marquez’s victory and vindication was 2:59 of round 6.

Everything about Saturday’s match was different from its predecessor conducted 13 months ago. This time, Marquez (55-6-1, 40 KOs) was the larger, stronger, more powerful man. Pacquiao (54-5-2, 38 KOs) was still the match’s quicker and busier fighter, but he was no longer its hunter.

After a pair of very even opening rounds, the third saw Marquez lean leftwards and catch Pacquiao with a looping right hand Pacquiao appeared to see but was surprised by nonetheless. Pacquiao dropped directly to the mat, in a stunning moment entirely unanticipated by anything seen from him in a decade of superfights. Pacquiao rose, however, and fought the still-cautious Marquez off him.

Marquez was still cautious for a reason. After another even round in the fourth, Pacquiao blitzed Marquez in the fifth, dropping him with a straight left, thrown from Pacquiao’s southpaw stance, that stunned Marquez but did not truly hurt him. It affected Pacquiao more than Marquez, actually, emboldening him towards recklessness. After nearly three minutes of attacking Marquez in the sixth, on his way to a two-point lead on all three judges’ scorecards, Pacquiao showed Marquez his signature move one time too many.

Pacquiao feinted the left cross, took a hop back, and then leaped at Marquez, hands-down. Marquez, his back on the ropes, dropped his head underneath Pacquiao’s left hand, and threw his right at Pacquiao’s chin. And in an instant, the Manny Pacquiao Era was ended.

YURIORKIS GAMBOA VS. MICHAEL FARENAS
The plan was this: His promoter, rapper 50 Cent, would drop from the ceiling, and then Yuriokoris Gamboa would drop his opponent directly on the canvas. “Fiddy” did his part.

Saturday’s co-main event, a far more competitive affair than anticipated, or perhaps desired, saw Cuban Yuriorkis Gamboa (22-0, 16 KOs) win a wide unanimous decision over Filipino Michael Farenas (33-4-4, 26 KOs) in a match that was not without suspense. Scores went 117-109, 118-108 and 117-108, all for Gamboa, who despite landing more than 550 punches was unable to stop Farenas and had to rise from the mat in round 9 to prevail.

After a first stanza that saw Gamboa’s superior reflexes and movement dominate, the second found Gamboa staggered by a pair of left crosses from the southpaw Farenas. Those punches from the Filipino, though, did little more than incite Gamboa – who felled Farenas in the final seconds of the stanza.

Round 3 found more aggression from Gamboa, but also some unexpected fortitude and defiance from Farenas, who both weathered Gamboa’s attack and staggered Gamboa again in the fourth with looped left hands, for which Gamboa seemed to have no comprehensive plan. Gamboa, whose attention span is short as his talent is long, often got himself struck by punches a lesser talented man – one who relied more on fundamentals than reflex – might have ducked or blocked.

After a sixth round that saw cuts over Farenas’ eyes deepen and bleed enough for a ringside doctor to give him a full examination before the seventh, Gamboa tore out his corner and tried to end the fight sensationally. After 45 second of ferocious combat, though, when a weakened Farenas was nevertheless still standing and trading, Gamboa’s activity dropped considerably, and while he did enough to win subsequent rounds, his willingness to chase a knockout more or less disappeared.

When it returned in the ninth, it nearly cost Gamboa the ‘0’ on his record, as the Cuban, sensing a knockout was near, walked himself directly into a counter left hand that dropped him on the blue mat. Gamboa rose on wobbly legs and held on tight for much of the next two minutes.

After an uneventful 10th and 11th, both men exchanged occasionally in the 12th but otherwise shuffled to the finish line, satisfied with not being felled again – even if it meant not felling the other man.

MIGUEL VAZQUEZ VS. MERCITO GESTA
It was a title match between an experienced but dull champion and an exciting but inexperienced challenger, and the champion owned it. Most every minute of it.

In the penultimate fight of Saturday’s undercard, Mexican Miguel Vazquez (25-3, 19 KOs) easily defended his IBF lightweight title, decisioning Filipino Mercito Gesta (26-1-1, 14 KOs) by unanimous scores of 117-111, 119-109 and 118-110. It may not have been that close.

After an opening round that saw Vazquez look characteristically slippery while Gesta did little to press an attack, the second and third saw Vazquez too quick, busy and awkward for Gesta. Vazquez would attack Gesta, and have certain success, and then Gesta, after patiently waiting, would decide it was his turn. By the time Gesta began his attack, though, Vazquez would be gone.

The next four rounds saw more of the same, as Gesta, for all his vaunted explosiveness against lesser opponents, simply did not have a solution for the problems an experienced champion like Vazquez proposed to him. Gesta threw ominous left hooks aplenty from his southpaw stance, but Vazquez picked them up scientifically, staying at the end of his quite long reach, and ensured he was either spinning away or ducking well beneath their plane by the time they went whipping past.

In round 8, Vazquez added a dull new wrinkle to his attack, staying at range till Gesta dropped his guard, and then rushing in with both hands, landing a clean punch or two, and tying Gesta up. Gesta appeared not to have the wherewithal or desire to fight his way out of the awkward Mexican’s awkward clinches, and the next three rounds passed without incident or emotion.

The final round passed exactly as its 11 predecessors had, with Vazquez, a professional counterpuncher and winner, if not entertainer, boxing, moving, clinching and confusing his way to another successful title defense.

JAVIER FORTUNA VS. PATRICK HYLAND
It was a battle of undefeated fighters, and while neither guy wanted to lose, neither guy wanted to win much either. The partisan-Mexican crowd that half-filled the arena did not appreciate it.

In the first televised match of Saturday’s pay-per-view telecast, Dominican featherweight Javier Fortuna (21-0, 15 KOs) decisioned limited Irishman Patrick Hyland (27-1, 12 KOs) by unanimous scores of 118-110, 116-112 and 115-113. Fortuna, who appeared a little unstable both at Friday’s weighin and points of Saturday’s fight, fell on his back in celebration upon hearing the decision.

The fight began badly, and after two dreadful rounds that saw neither man engage and Fortuna in hands-down retreat, a lowblow made things briefly interesting and Fortuna briefly more offensive in the third. That brief display of offense by Fortuna was more than enough for Hyland to put his own fists away and spend two rounds focused on defense, blocking and ducking, and generally not punching.

In round 7, after 18 minutes of routine booing from the Garden Arena crowd, Hyland appeared to close space slightly and land a few decent right hands on the southpaw Dominican. The eighth brought increased fatigue to both men, which brought actual infighting and enough action for the crowd to cease its hectoring, if not increase its cheers.

The ninth saw a pair of unintentional fouls send Fortuna reeling to a neutral corner, followed by the entire fight’s best minute of sustained combat, as each man briefly took the other’s punches personally before returning to less-belligerent form. The 10th had the less-talented Hyland appearing to want to fight, and the more-talented Fortuna demonstratively displeased with anything that wasn’t clean punching.

The championship rounds passed uneventfully, with neither man daring to do anything daring, as the championship being contested was only the WBA interim featherweight title after all.

UNDERCARD
Saturday’s swing bout, a four-round scrap between local featherweight Alexis Hernandez (3-1, 1 KO) and New Mexican Jazzma Hogue (2-4-1) did not last long and did not look pretty, with Hernandez prevailing by TKO at 2:20 of round 1.

Before that, U.S. Olympian Jose Ramirez (1-0, 1 KO), a lightweight from California, made his professional debut against designated victim Corey Siegwarth (2-2, 1 KO) of Colorado. Charging out his corner and swarming Siegwarth from the opening bell, Ramirez moved well and threw punches in combination while showing good defense, stopping Siegwarth at 2:05 of round 1. As many clean punches as Ramirez needed to finish Siegwarth, time will tell how much power he has brought with him to the pro ranks.

Saturday’s second match saw Filipino featherweight Dodie Boy Penalosa (10-0, 10 KOs) stop Floridian Jesus Lule-Raya (2-2) suddenly and violently at 1:12 of round 2. Undefeated as he is, and with his victories coming the way they do, it will be interesting to see how Penalosa’s coming improvement in competition goes.

The evening began with a surprisingly two-sided affair between Filipino super featherweight Ernie Sanchez (14-3, 5 KOs) and Philadelphian Coy Evans (10-2-1, 2 KOs). Both men were hurt early in the fight, with Evans being sent to the mat by a right hand from Sanchez, but neither succumbed to the other’s numerous but light punches, and Sanchez prevailed by unanimous decision: 78-73, 78-73 and 77-74.

Opening bell rang on an empty MGM Grand Garden Arena at 4:06 PM local time.

LAS VEGAS – Evidence of Juan Manuel Marquez’ new found power is circulating like an ominous preview in video of his brutal stoppage of a sparring partner. But Manny Pacquiao hasn’t seen it. Won’t lose any sleep thinking about it.

“I’m not worried about it,’’ Pacquiao said Friday after the formal weigh-in for his fourth fight Saturday night with Marquez at the MGM Grand. “I took Antonio Margarito’s best punch.’’

In the sixth round of a 2010 victory over Margarito at Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, Tex., Pacquiao was rocked by left hook to the body. It was one of the punches Margarito had used with devastating efficiency throughout his career as a brawler.

“I was lucky to survive that round,’’ Pacquiao said then.

In a lesson delivered by Margarito’s left hand, Pacquiao might have experience and confidence to go along with the luck he’ll need against Marquez.

Sellout equals heavyweight standard
Top Rank announced Friday that it had sold out the MGM’s Grand Garden Arena’s 16,000-plus seats for Marquez-Pacquiao. Promoter Bob Arum said the gate would generate more than $10.6 million. More than $10 million in tickets were sold for the third Marquez-Pacquiao fight, also at the MGM Grand.

It’s the first time rematches have done more than $10 million at the gate for each bout since Evander Holyfield beat Mike Tyson in 1996 and beat him again in 1997 at the cost of an ear lobe, also at the MGM Grand.

Notes, quotes
· Tyson was introduced to a noisy, cheering crowd at the weigh-in. The former heavyweight champ asked fans to support his charitable foundation, Mike Tyson Cares. Meanwhile, he’s getting ready to take his Broadway show on a national tour of 36 cities. “I’m like Frankenstein,’’ Tyson said. “A lot of people have put me together.’’

· After stepping off the scale, Pacquiao, a Filipino Congressman and Lieutenant Colonel in the Army Reserve, dedicated Saturday night’s fight on HBO’s pay-per-view television to fellow Filipinos hit by Typhoon Bopha. There were reports Friday of than 500 dead and 400 missing. There 310,000 left homeless.

· Former welterweight rivals Tommy Hearns and Sugar Ray Leonard are in Las Vegas for Chapter IV in the Pacquiao-Marquez rivalry. Hearns picks Pacquiao to win. Leonard played it safe. He didn’t pick anybody.

LAS VEGAS – It was not particularly eventful, far as these things go – two muscular men stripped to their underwear, stepped on a scale, had their weights read, dismounted, and posed shirtless for photographers beneath the stage – but it was not entirely without event. Mike Tyson saw to that.

Friday afternoon at MGM Grand Garden Arena, Filipino welterweight Manny Pacquiao and his career nemesis, Mexican Juan Manuel Marquez, each made weight for their Saturday fight, a match that will complete a storied tetralogy in the very venue where it began.

Pacquiao made the welterweight limit of 147 pounds. Marquez came in three pounds below at 143.

“It’s going to be a war,” Marquez said immediately afterwards. “It’s going to be a war.”

If the fight will be the battle Marquez promised, he is the man who appears to have the heavier artillery this time. As part of a controversial strength and conditioning regimen conducted in Mexico with a controversial strength and conditioning coach, Marquez has added a significant quotient of muscle in his recent training camps and removed fat while doing it – a feat once believed nigh impossible for a man approaching his 40th birthday, as Marquez now does.

It is an edge Marquez, 0-2-1 in his three matches with Pacquiao, believes will mark the necessary “grain” of difference he needs.

“I would like to pray for all the families affected by the storm in the Philippines,” said Pacquiao, after making weight, replying to a question about a natural disaster that struck his native land this month. “I am dedicating this fight to them.”

Pacquiao, who looked very good, if not muscular as Marquez, Friday, has downplayed his opponent’s noteworthy growth in the last 15 months, answering questions about Marquez’s size with appeals to larger men Pacquiao has fought, and bigger punchers, too.

That may be, but did any of them have a history of hitting Pacquiao often or accurately as Marquez does?

“Not the biggest fight, possibly,” Marquez said of Saturday’s fourth match with Pacquiao and its place in his career. “The most important.”

Asked if, as a congressman in the Philippines, he still had the “fire in his belly” required to beat up a prizefighter gifted, dedicated and fixated on victory as Marquez is, Pacquiao was terse but adamant.

“Yes, sir,” he said.

Friday’s weighin, while not the fire-marshal-bar-the-doors affair previous Pacquiao weighins have been, was well-attended by what sounded like a partisan-Mexican crowd. Also in attendance was world middleweight champion Sergio Martinez, who kept a characteristically low profile.

Keeping a characteristically higher profile was former world heavyweight champion Mike Tyson, in town, and in MGM Grand, to promote and perform “Mike Tyson Cares: Giving Kids a Fighting Chance,” a show Tyson will host at MGM Grand’s Tabu Ultra Lounge, Friday night.

Tyson, whose euphoria at being on stage for a superfight weighin was pronounced, as evidenced by his constant smile and interaction with undercard fighters throughout, spent only a moment center-stage, waving and bowing to loud applause, then saying: “And make sure you come out!”

Doors for “Pacquiao-Marquez 4,” an eight-match card, will open at 3:00 PM local time, with opening bell scheduled to ring at 3:45. The four-fight pay-per-view televised portion of the card will begin at 6:00 PM. 15rounds.com will have full ringside coverage.

LAS VEGAS – Threat of a lawsuit is little bit like opening bell. Hear one and you can be sure the fight is about to begin.

Opening bell for the fourth chapter Saturday in the Manny Pacquiao-Juan Manuel Marquez rivalry was still a couple of days away, but the lawsuit threat echoed Thursday through the MGM Grand’s press room with a buzz that said only fury will settle the differences that divide the opposing camps.

Marquez’ controversial strength coach Angel Heredia promised to sue Pacquiao trainer Freddie Roach for comments in USA Today that implied the heavily-muscled Marquez had been using performance enhancers. Roach didn’t need to consult an attorney for his response.

“He’s a piece of bleep,’’ said Roach, who also called Heredia “a rat” during roundtable sessions with the trainer.

Flush the legalese.

It’s hard to know whether Heredia is just posturing or has been caught up in the hyperbole that always intensifies during the countdown for a major bout. He’s a relative newcomer to boxing’s outhouse. But Heredia’s notorious resume is accented with inevitable questions. During the Balco scandal, he testified he had a role in giving PEDS to Olympic track-and-field medalists, including Marion Jones and Tim Montgomery.

Roach reads the testimony, looks at the bulked-up Marquez and says what many fans are thinking. No surprise there. Roach, a Hall of Fame veteran of fight-week hype, might be using the moment to play some mind games. That’s as fundamental as a feint. Whatever he was doing, Heredia’s anger is enough to wonder if it has entered into his conversation with Marquez and trainer Nacho Beristain.

“We’re going to meet up with my lawyers,’’ Heredia told the media Wednesday after a formal news conference.

If there is a meeting about anything other than how to beat Pacquiao for the first time, then Roach will have succeeded in throwing the first feint.

Notes, Quotes, Anecdotes
The intensity of the Pacquiao-Marquez rivalry makes it impossible to predict how their relationship will be after the final bell. “My relationship with him is one of respect,’’ Marquez said. “It will always be inside the ring. But outside of the ring?’’ Marquez left some doubt about whether they could be friends. “That’s his problem,’’ Pacquiao said.

Purses: According to contracts filed with the Nevada State Athletic Commission, Marquez is guaranteed $3 million and Pacquiao $8.595 million. That doesn’t count the international money. Bob Arum says Pacquiao will collect at least $26 million after it’s all counted. “We haven’t knocked out anybody lately and we got a loss in our last fight,’’ Roach said of Pacquiao’s controversial loss by decision to Tim Bradley in June. “So we’re taking a cut in pay.’’

LAS VEGAS – Distractions and Manny Pacquiao have been inseparable for at least a year. But it’s beginning to look as if he has discarded that piece of troublesome baggage.

The distracted Pacquiao was gone Thursday. In his place, there was the engaging personality remembered for entering the ring with the smile of a kid headed to a few rounds on the playground.

“He’s having fun,’’ Pacquiao trainer Freddie Roach said before a formal news conference at the MGM Grand. “When he’s having fun, he’s hard to beat.’’

Little about a rivalry just a few days from a fourth fight, also at the MGM Grand, looks like much fun. Through 36 rounds, Pacquiao has the edge with two controversial decisions and a draw. But instead of celebration, there’s been controversy. Marquez argues the ledger should read 3-0 in his favor.

“He claims he won,’’ Pacquiao said. “He needs to prove something. I wanted to give him that chance. Maybe he can prove something.’’

The momentum, at least, seems to be on Marquez’ side, especially if the rivalry stretches to 48 rounds in an HBO pay-per-view bout. Much of the public agrees with Marquez, enough perhaps to finally swing the scorecards in his favor.

“My motivation is that I want them to raise my hand in the ring,’’ said Marquez, who showed up at the interview session in a crowded lounge off the casino floor looking edgy in a down jacket that was zipped all the way up to his scarred chin. “I don’t want people to just say, ‘You really beat him.’

“I want them to know that I beat him.’’

For Pacquiao, there might be only one way to do that:

By knockout.

But can he? In 2004, Pacquiao knocked Marquez down three times in the first round. Yet, Marquez managed to recover, rally and fight to a draw. Both have moved up the scale, from featherweight to lightweight for the first rematch and 144 pounds for the third fight. Along the way, there’s speculation that Pacquiao lost some power, or at least enough of it to cut his chances at stopping Marquez from good to negligible.

But Roach says Pacquiao was still an evolving fighter in 2004, meaning he didn’t possess the right hand he developed against David Diaz in 2008. Before their third fight in November, 2011, there were Pacquiao’s well-documented distractions, including marital problems and political campaigns.

“I still say Marquez hasn’t seen the best Manny,’’ Roach said. “This time he will.’’

Evidence of that, Roach said, came in training at the Wild Card Gym in Hollywood, Calif. Pacquiao knocked down sparring partners four times. There were zero knockdowns in training for Pacquaio’s controversial loss to Tim Bradley. There were none in camp for his majority decision over Pacquiao about 13 months ago. Pacquiao hasn’t knocked down a sparring partner since training for his 12th-round stoppage of Miguel Cotto in 2009.

“Manny said he wanted to go back to the Manny of 2004,’’ Roach said. “I wasn’t sure that was possible. But he’s had four knockdowns in training. He’s on fire right now.’’

But Marquez has found a way to cool that fire with counter-punching that interrupts pace and prevents the instinctive Pacquiao from getting into a rhythm, an unstoppable roll. There’s also the simple issue of Marquez’ muscle-bound upper-body, thanks to controversial strength coach Angel Heredia.

Heredia, who joined Marquez for the third fight, testified in the Balco case that he provided performance-enhancers to Olympic track-and-field medalists. Heredia’s presence raises inevitable questions. They were there in 2011 and they are back a year later. Marquez, annoyed at all of the questioning, has told the media he is prepared to undergo testing. In the PED swamp, however, there are always rumors and suspicions. Ask Lance Armstrong.

Mexican promoter Fernando Beltran introduced Marquez in a way that only makes you wonder about the relationship with Heredia.

“Built like Hulk,’’ Beltran said.

It might be hard to knock down Hulk. It’ll be harder to knock him out.

But Roach has his own theory.

“You put on a lot of muscle for a reason,’’ Roach said. “If he wants to exchange, that’ll be better for us.’’

LAS VEGAS — Jose Benavidez Jr., unbeaten at junior-welterweight, withdrew from a scheduled bout Thursday night at The Mirage, because of concerns about further injury to his right hand, according to Jose Benavidez Sr., his father and trainer.

“When we come back, I just want us to be back at 100 percent,’’ his dad said.

Benavidez (17-0, 13 KOs) was nearly knocked out in the final seconds of an eight-round bout by Pavel Miranda (17-8-1, 5 KOs) on Oct. 13 at Home Depot Center in Carson, Calif., on a card featuring Brandon Rios’ dramatic stoppage of Mike Alvarado in the likely Fight of the Year.

Benavidez, a Phoenix prospect, escaped with a unanimous decision, scoring almost exclusively with his accurate jab. He also appeared to tire in the seventh round, perhaps because he struggled to make weight, 140 pounds.

“Then, I think we were looking ahead to the next fight,’’ Jose Sr. said. “We didn’t work the right hand in that one, because I think we were thinking about that fight in December. Things have happened so fast since that last fight.’’

Initially, the 20-year-old Benavidez had hoped to fight on the undercard Saturday of the fourth bout between Manny Pacquiao and Juan Manuel Marquez in an HBO pay-per-view event at the MGM Grand. Instead, Top Rank announced a few weeks ago that Benavidez would face Jesus Selig (15-1-1, 9 KOs) on a Dec. 6 card televised by ESPN2. Top Rank was surprised by Benavidez’s withdrawal.

Benavidez, who signed with Top Rank as a 17-year-old, underwent surgery in January on his right hand and wrist after aggravating an injury during a victory over Sammy Santana in November, 2011 on the undercard of Pacquiao’s controversial decision over Marquez in their third fight.

An MRI revealed an extra bone in the wrist, according to physicians. It was causing Benavidez pain. According to reports, a laser procedure removed the source of that pain. A damaged tendon also was repaired.

After a five-month layoff, Benavidez returned to the ring, fighting three times — a six-round unanimous decision over Josh Sosa (10-4, 5 KOs) in May, a fourth-round stoppage of Javier Loya (7-1, 6 KOs) in August and then Miranda.

Plans are now for him to fight again early next year, perhaps in February, his dad and manager Steven Feder said.

“I just told him to enjoy the Holidays, rest and get ready for next year,’’ Jose Sr. said.

Mike Tyson talked Monday about life in the ring, life on the stage and about how surprised he is to be alive at all.

“Hey, I didn’t think I’d make it to 25,’’ Tyson, now 46, said during a conference call for a national tour of his Broadway show, “Mike Tyson: Undisputed Truth.”

It will stop in 36 cities, starting on Feb. 12 in Indianapolis where Tyson was convicted on a rape charge and including Feb. 24 in Phoenix where his daughter died.

In a wide-ranging interview with fight writers and the entertainment press, Tyson was relaxed and philosophical. The Spike-Lee directed show, he said, allows him to talk about circumstances and pressures that led to crazy headlines generated throughout his heavyweight reign. Through the years, he said, he has matured, finding fulfillment through acting and charity work that he never had in boxing.

“I really learned a lot about myself,’’ he said. “I learned I’m an interesting guy. I’m a guy who wants to fit in. I’m not sure where that came from.’’

Boxing is like acting in one way.

“The doubt and the fear of being a failure is there,’’ Tyson said.

But there is a difference.

“You don’t have to go to the hospital afterwards,’’ he said.

True to the show’s title, Tyson says little is out-of-bounds. The 80-minute script includes the pain of losing 4-year-old Exodus, who died in 2009 after a freak accident on a tread mill in Phoenix where Tyson had lived and trained for a few years following his release from prison in 1995.

“I talk about my daughter at the end of the show,’’ said Tyson, whose stop in Phoenix is scheduled for Comerica Theatre, just a few blocks of roadwork from where he trained at Central Boxing. “That’s not a pretty sight.’’

Tyson’s time in Arizona was a snapshot of who he was and how he is remembered.

In 1999, he was handcuffed by law enforcement authorities at Central and returned to jail for a road-rage incident in Maryland.

In 2001, he underwent a polygraph in Phoenix. He has always said he was not guilty of rape in Indianapolis. According to results acquired by The Arizona Republic, Tyson was truthful when he said he did not rape Desiree Washington.

A few years later, he was questioned about his relationship with Dale Hausner, who is currently sitting on death row for a series of murders committed between 2005 and 2006. Tyson said law enforcement came into the gym. They said they asked about Hausner, who had worked as a ringside photographer at Phoenix bouts.

“I was in a picture on his website,’’ Tyson said. “Turns out, the guy was going out and sniping people.’’

Today, Tyson says, he thinks of himself when he hears about the deaths of Hector Camacho, Johnny Tapia and Arturo Gatti.

“All the time, my friend, all the time,’’ he said. “They weren’t as reckless as I was. Reckless out in the open, if you know what I mean. I thought it could be me if I hadn’t made these changes in my life.’’

I did not expect to look forward to this week’s fourth match between Filipino Manny Pacquiao and Mexican Juan Manuel Marquez. I submitted my credential request, booked my flight to Las Vegas and reserved my hotel room for Dec. 8 under a spell of grim determination, not euphoria; this would make a tetralogy of the rivalry for which this era of prizefighting will be remembered, and I should witness it if I am able. I am now excited, though, because of an unlikely source – the third episode of HBO’s “24/7” program – and its subversion of a usually reliable imperviousness to hype. We’ll return.

What is likeliest to happen Saturday is another close fight, but one Pacquiao rightfully wins with hustle, followed by a set of scorecards that give Marquez a comfortable decision. Pacquiao has lost his novelty in Las Vegas, and while Marquez ever had little, the Mexican has at least gone to the trouble of reengineering his body in a Vegas-like way, erecting in just 15 months a breathtaking spectacle nature will raze in five years (or at least by the time Marquez arrrives in Canastota). That and previous scoring shenanigans make Marquez, for once, a more appealing figure in Las Vegas than Pacquiao.

In his exhaustive reevaluation of art history, British writer Paul Johnson opines of this week’s host city: “Nothing in Las Vegas is built to last except the roulette wheels. It is a city which, architecturally, is always in the immediate present, never in the past or future. It is Ephemeropolis.” In Johnson’s sense, neither Pacquiao nor Marquez is very much an Ephemeropolis fighter. Both have, in their ways, endeavored to be more permanent figures than Las Vegas generally appreciates; their careers cannot be divided in chapters named after trainers the way Oscar De La Hoya’s can be, they haven’t the shamelessness or salesmanship of American heavyweights, and they both lack Floyd Mayweather’s capacity for reinvention. Both are for the most part beneficiaries of a meritocracy, and while each now comes to the logical ends of his meriting millions of dollars to fight, both have, with very few exceptions, deserved the fortunes they’ve amassed as entertainers who combat honestly the men put in front of them.

If you did not see Saturday’s episode of HBO’s “24/7” program, if after the preceding week’s absurd Filipino donut-vending and Mexican jumpy-jump partying, you vowed never to watch another moment of the “24/7” franchise, you are, of course, forgiven, though also surprisingly unfortunate. Saturday’s episode was an unpredicted return to what camp footage made the series’ 2007 introduction compelling. It wasn’t choreographed handpad tricks and portentous stretching, either, but actual punching in combination, with the camera acting more as reporter than novelist.

Saturday’s episode did an uncharacteristically good job of examining the relationships between the fighters and their monkish trainers, with Freddie Roach admitting and then recanting that Pacquiao has become the boss of his camps, a degree of control, one can extrapolate, inversely proportionate to the quality of Pacquiao’s fighting since his 2009 stoppage of Miguel Cotto. More interesting still was a very short clip of Nacho Beristain giving Marquez, whom Beristain has trained for more than 20 years and made this generation’s master of efficient motion, a direct instruction:

“Throw right uppercut, hook, straight right,” Beristain said, and then he raised his finger as an instructor. “But parallel, Juan, the shoulders, principally (when throwing) the hook.”

There was no question who was the boss so long as Marquez wore gloves, a supplicant position in which Marquez voluntarily and fully places himself and Pacquiao once did more than he does today. Roach, by episode’s end, committed to restoring balance in his gym, but one could see Pacquiao’s annoyance with interruptions of his private rhythm and strategizing. Roach, in an enthusiastic pursuit of wealth and celebrity, has seen his relationship with Pacquiao revised while taking on charges like Julio Cesar Chavez Jr., unwilling to submit long to privation, and Amir Khan, unable to succeed with any punch-to-hurt curriculum, such that aficionados, and Roach himself, now openly question Roach’s primacy among trainers.

While there is little doubt Roach understands what Pacquiao must do to beat Marquez well as Beristain does, there does not appear a same technical fluency between Roach and Pacquiao as between Beristain and Marquez. Some of that is inevitable, with Roach and Pacquiao not sharing a native language like Beristain and Marquez do, but much of it is this: Roach did not teach Pacquiao how to box; he took a physical prodigy and improved him. Beristain, conversely, can query from his mind’s database the exact image of a teenage Marquez learning where to put his feet on the blue mat, and phrase precisely a problem whose solving will have Marquez position Marquez how Beristain wishes him.

Expect little new from either man Saturday. Though Pacquiao’s reflexes and conditioning will not be what they were in 2009 they will remain superior enough to outbusy Marquez if he so chooses, and that is Pacquiao’s best way of winning a third decision, on an objective scorecard. Marquez will be exactly what he was in fights I, II and III, and if he repeats his performance from 13 months ago, it says here, he’ll win comfortably on official scorecards. The only possibility for novelty this match holds is if Marquez, now physically enhanced enough to redden all faces at the Nevada State Athletic Commission, hurts Pacquiao. There is no better closer in boxing than Marquez – and a tetralogy that ended with Pacquiao felled thrice would be historic in its symmetry first of all.

That is too unlikely. So I’ll take Pacquiao, this time, in a fight the judges score for Marquez.

Bart Barry can be reached at bart.barrys.email (at) gmail.com.

NEW YORK– Austin Trout remained the WBA Super Welterweight championship with a twelve round unanimous decision at Madison Square Garden

Trout got it going early as he rocked Cotto with a hard left hand in the first frame. The two continued to box at Trout’s preferred distance for much of the first three rounds. The action started to heat up in round four as there was more in fighting which started to suit the challenger. Cotto had a good round six as he landed a flush right hand and a nice flurry at the bell.

The second half of the fight had more intensity. with both guys loading up with power shots. Trout favored the left hand with both hooks and uppercuts. Trout had a big round ten as he moved and continued to pop Cotto with lefts to start the round and three nice rights in the closing moments. Trout had a big round eleven as he continued to bust up the face of Cotto, by at this time was swelled and the left eye was beginning to close. the final round saw some furious exchanges down the stretch

Trout won by scores of 119-109, 117-111 and 117-111 (15rounds.com had it 116-112 for Trout) and is now 26-0. Cotto is 38-4

“Miguel Cotto is a great champion,” said Trout. “He’s a great fighter and it was an honor to be in the same ring as him. It’s even more of an honor to be the man to beat him. To have my hand raised against a kingpin like Miguel Cotto is a dream come true.

“Those shots that Cotto hit me with were strong and I knew he’d be strong, but it reconfirmed that take those shots. It was definitely the hardest fight of my career and when you fight someone as big as Miguel Cotto, it motivated me.

“Give me Canelo – it’s time to unify this division” Trout said. “There are a lot of good fighters out there and I want to be the best.”

When asked by Gray what he thought went wrong in the fight and if he agreed with the scorecards, Cotto simply replied, “Ask the public.”

“I’m satisfied with the job I did tonight,” Cotto said. “I’ll go back to Puerto Rico and think. He came at me with both hands and it was a great fight. He fought until the end. I’m really thankful for all of my fans who were here to supported me tonight. There’s nothing like fighting at Madison Square Garden.”

“It was easier than I thought,” Velez said. “I thought it would be a little more difficult. I was connecting so easily. This is a very exciting moment for me. I’ve been waiting for this my whole life.”

Jayson Velez remained perfect with a third round destruction of Salvador Sanchez II in a scheduled ten round Featherweight bout. Velez began his aasault in round two when he landed a big right hand just before the bell that sent Sanchez to the canvas. Seconds into round three, another booming right that was followed by a left sent Sanchez down for a second time. Velez landed a couple more hard rights that buckled Sanchez and referee Harvey Dock stopped the bout at thirty-eight seconds of round three

Velez, 125.8 lbs of Juncos, PR is now 20-0 with fifteen knockouts. Sanchez II is now 30-5-3.

Daniel Jacobs made it two in a row since his return from cancer as he took out Chris Fitzpatrick at the end of round five in a scheduled ten round Middleweight bout.

Jacobs was in control from the opening bell. In round three, Jacobs landed a big right and left that drove Fitzpatrick to the ropes. Jacobs began to open up. A clash of heads opened up a cut on the forehead of Fitzpatrick. In round four a couple more hard shots to the head shots put Fitzpatrick in more distress. In round five, Jacobs unloaded a barrage of punches that chased Fitzpatrick all over the ring. Jacobs battered Fitzpatrick until the bell rang to signal the end of the round. Fitzpatrick wisely called it a night on his stool

Jacobs, 161.2 lbs of Brooklyn is now 24-1 with twenty-one knockouts. Fitzpatrick, 163.3 lbs of Cleveland, OH is now 15-3.

“I felt pretty good today. I wanted to take my time. I heard a few boos, but I hope the crowd appreciates it. I’m satisfied. I let my hands go. I’m just glad that I got five rounds to get the rust out. I’m back as a contender. We don’t want to jump the gun, but I think I’m back.

Jorge Melendez scored a fourth round stoppage over James Winchester in a scheduled eight round Super Welterweight bout.

Melendez battered Winchester in round one and dropped the twenty-two fight veteran for the first time in round two and again in round three. Melendez opened up the fourth by waling away on Winchester and the bout was stopped at fifty-four seconds

Melendez, 155 lbs of Manati, PR is now 25-2-1 with twenty-four knockouts. Winchester, 155 lbs of Greensboro, NC is now 15-7

Jorge Diaz scored a first round knockdown en route to a six round unanimous decision over Victor Salazar in a Featherweight bout.

Diaz battered Salazar at different parts of the fight and cruised home to a 60-53 victory on all cards.

Diaz, 122.4 lbs of New Brunswick, NJ is now 17-1. Salazar, 126 lbs of Houston, TX is now 3-5-1.

In an entertaining battle of undefeated Jr. Middleweights, Eddie Gomez took a six round unanimous decision over Luis Hernandez.

Both guts landed good shots but Gomez was more active and won despite being deducted a point in round five for a low blow

Gomez, 150 lbs of Bronx, NY won by scores of 58-55, 59-54 and 59-54 and is now 12-0. Hernandez., 152 lbs of Rio Piedras, PR is now 9-1.

John Thompson scored a six round unanimous decision over Eli Augustama in a Middleweight bout.

Thompson boxed well for the first four rounds but got caught with some power punches over the last two rounds but Thompson built up enough of an advantage early to hold on for the victory.

Thompson, 156.4 lbs of Newark, NJ won by scores of 60-54, 59-55 and 59-55 and is now 9-0. Augustama, 158 lbs of Port Au Prince, Haiti is now 6-6.

Just when there seems to be no solution for the Top Rank-Golden Boy feud that has sent boxing past the fistic cliff and into an abyss with no bottom in sight, I think about Miguel Cotto.

He’s not a talker, at least not in the noisy way things are done from the promotional stage. He’s been criticized for that in his dual role as a promoter for his Showtime-televised bout Saturday night against Austin Trout at Madison Square Garden.

But verbiage at high volume has never been what Cotto is all about. Blame him only if you like all the screaming. I applaud him. The Puerto Rican’s quiet, thoughtful nature stands alone, an island amid all the chaos.

It’s anybody’s guess as to whether that will work for him in his evolving role as a promoter.

“There is a balance of being a fighter and a promoter,’’ Cotto said during the final news conference for a bout his company is promoting in association with Golden Boy. “This was an idea my father had and I am happy we are doing a good job of making the company as successful as it is. My father picked three excellent people to run the company. I don’t have to occupy too much of my time to help them with the day to day.’’

With the right people in place, Cotto only has to be the person he has always been.

In a business fractured by petty rivalries and grudges, everybody respects Cotto. Who else can say that? He’s been called tough. But it’s more than just that. Antonio Margarito was tough, but not respected because of suspicions he beat Cotto in 2008 with altered hand-wraps discovered in early 2009 before a loss to Shane Mosley. Cotto’s response to the Margarito loss and subsequent controversy revealed a personal trait everybody admires. He’s accountable.

When questions were raised about whether Margarito wore the disputed wraps on the night of Cotto’s first loss, Cotto said he couldn’t complain. He blamed his camp’s lack of vigilance. He said his corner failed to have anybody in the opposing dressing room when Margarito’s hands were wrapped. There has since been an argument about that. Margarito’s management has said there was a Cotto representative there.

Whoever was or wasn’t there, it is Cotto’s character that stands the test of time. He didn’t whine. Instead, he got the rematch he long sought and resolved his own doubts a year ago by beating Margarito with a stoppage as old-school as the first testament.

Not long after Margarito, Cotto’s contract with Top Rank ended. In May, he fought and lost a unanimous decision to Floyd Mayweather Jr., at Las Vegas’ MGM Grand on a card promoted by Mayweather in association with Golden Boy. Cotto trained during the week before opening bell in Vegas at Top Rank’s gym. He fought on HBO then. He fights on Showtime Saturday night. He has maintained a working relationship with all of the feuding parties in boxing’s great divide.

Why? Because they respect him.

In Cotto, they trust.

I don’t know if that trust is a way to mend fences. I don’t know if it could lead to, say, Nonito Donaire-versus-Abner Mares.

But if Top Rank and Golden Boy are looking for an example, Cotto is a pretty good beginning.

AZ Notes
Top Rank prospect Jose Benavidez Jr. (17-0, 13 KOs) of Phoenix is scheduled to fight Mexican Jesus Selig (15-1-1, 9 KOs) next Thursday night on an ESPN2-televised card at The Mirage in Las Vegas. Benavidez will be fighting as a welterweight, seven pounds heavier than his usual 140. He appeared to tire in his last fight on Oct. 13 when he was nearly knocked out by Pavel Miranda in a junior-welterweight bout in Carson, Calif. He might have struggled to make weight.

Iron Boy Promotions of Scottsdale stages another card Friday night at Celebrity Theatre in Phoenix. Opening bell is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. Eight bouts are scheduled, including a six-round main event between bantamweights Alexis “Beaver” Santiago (11-3-1, 5 KOs) of Phoenix and Jensen Ramirez (2-1-2) of Tucson.

Austin “No Doubt” Trout might not be a name commonly heard at the dinner table. Sure he is not the most popular boxer out there, but he certainly possesses the qualities of a boxing star. On Saturday night, at Madison Square Garden in New York City, Trout expects to showcase those qualities when he steps into the ring to defend his WBA Jr. Middleweight title against the great Miguel Cotto.

Like so many great boxers, Trout began his career at the young age of ten. Not long afterwards, he progressed competitively and eventually one of the nation’s best amateur boxers, winning a national championship in 2004. One thing he didn’t expect when turning professional was the hardships he would endure as a talented yet low profile boxer. Nobody wanted to fight him. He fights out of the southpaw stance, and possesses the ability to either box from the outside or brawl his way to a victory; a very dangerous combination of skills.

Trout’s response to those hardships was to train even harder. His theory was that if he continued to work hard and win, he would be recognized by the sanctioning organizations and high profile fights would come his way. That happened in 2011 when he was able to win the WBA interim title which was subsequently elevated to the “regular” champion.

“I don’t want to be anonymous anymore,” stated Trout while on a conference call with the media. “I feel like the powers that be don’t necessarily want me in the boxing game, because I feel like I’m a thorn to everybody’s side that have to fight me.”

Come Saturday, he will stand across the ring from his toughest test yet. While Trout was winning his aforementioned amateur title, Cotto was already an established world class fighter being featured on television. Cotto’s record features the top fighters of his generation such as Floyd Mayweather Jr., Manny Pacquiao, Antonio Margarito, Shane Mosley, Zab Judah, and Paul Malignaggi amongst others.

Asked about his reaction when he heard that he would be facing Cotto, Trout exclaimed, “I was shocked that he chose a fighter like me, because a lot of times I’ve been known as high risk, low reward, even with the belt.”

He is actually a fan of Cotto’s abilities, even going so far as to request an autograph which was televised on Showtime’s “Cotto vs. Trout: All Access;” a program where viewers are given an inside look into the lives of both boxers as they prepare for their bout. “Cotto is a very powerful and explosive fighter,” said trout, “and I’ve not necessarily faced anybody as explosive as him, but I think I’ve faced people that have been as strong as him.”

And just as he has always been, Trout’s response to the challenges awaiting him is to hit the gym and work harder than ever. “I haven’t changed anything; it’s just a more intense camp,”

“Showdown: Cotto vs. Trout” is a 12-round battle between Four-Time and Three-Division World Champion Miguel Cotto and undefeated WBA Super Welterweight World Champion Austin Trout taking place on Saturday, December 1 at Madison Square Garden in New York City. The co-featured fights will see Jayson Velez take on Salvador Sanchez in a 10-round fight for the vacant WBC Silver Featherweight title and Danny “Miracle Man” Jacobs battle Chris “The Irish Ghost” Fitzpatrick in an eight-round middleweight fight. The event is promoted by Miguel Cotto Promotions and Golden Boy Promotions in association with Greg Cohen Promotions, sponsored by The Puerto Rican Tourism Board and Corona and will be televised live on SHOWTIME at 9:00 p.m. ET/PT (delayed on the west coast).

Tickets priced at $500, $300, $200, $100 and $50, not including applicable service charges and taxes, are available for purchase at the Madison Square Garden Box Office, all Ticketmaster outlets, Ticketmaster charge by phone (866-858-0008) and online at www.ticketmaster.com or www.thegarden.com

Claudia Bocanegra was front and Center at Madison Square Garden to get the images of Wednesday’s final press conference before Austin Trout defends the WBA Super Welterweight title against Miguel Cotto this Saturday at Madison Square Garden
CLICK TO ENLARGE PHOTOS

15rounds.com Claudia Bocanegra was on hand at Gleason’s Gym in Brooklyn to capture three-division world champion Miguel Cotto working put in advance of his Saturday showdown with WBA Super Welterweight champion Austin Trout this Saturday at Madison Square Garden
CLICK TO ENLARGE PHOTOS

Television, a medium silly as it is ubiquitous, tells very few truths and perhaps none disinterestedly. In keeping with its current place in sports, boxing, as a gathering of only free agents, is, on television, a less-disinterested place than most. Praise any bubble of truth, then, that somehow rises through television’s thick, shifting filters and brings a spectacle honest as Oscar De La Hoya’s face. Whatever he is as a promoter, De La Hoya very apparently loves to see men punch one another, and his face, 25 feet back from the ring, visible between the ropes, center of the screen for most Golden Boy Promotions telecasts, is, anymore, the most honest television commentator boxing has.

De La Hoya’s face on Saturday, while Robert Guerrero was beating Andre Berto 116-110 and 116-110 and 116-110 in Ontario, Calif., in an interim title match on HBO, was often a picture of euphoria. De La Hoya’s face spoke to a couple happenings: His fighter, Guerrero, was not genuinely imperiled for a moment of the match (doubters should find contrasting footage of De La Hoya’s face during Johnathon Banks’ Nov. 17 dismantling of Seth Mitchell), and the fight itself was a spectacle of punching performed by two men who knew how – which anyone reading this ought love as much as De La Hoya helplessly does.

The most important discovery Saturday brought was that Andre Berto, a career welterweight, was unable to hurt Robert Guerrero, who, recently as last year a lightweight and recently as 2009 a super featherweight, took Berto’s flush right uppercuts, thrown with what appeared to be perfect leverage and ferocious intent, much better than he took Selcuk Aydin’s same punches in July. Is Guerrero that much tougher than he looked just four months ago, or is Berto, after a suspension for PED use, not the force, or not capable of summoning the force, he was or once did?

If Saturday’s excellent fight lacked suspense at times, and it did no matter the assiduous sales pitch tossed HBO viewers’ ways, it was because Guerrero never once appeared out of control or discomfited by Berto. Guerrero’s lead eye closed, as did both of Berto’s, but that wasn’t the ordeal it might have been if either guy had space enough to throw a full combination from proper range in the fight’s final nine minutes. One detected genuine panic in Guerrero’s bearing during his July match with Aydin, whom Guerrero held for desperation more than strategy, but that panicked bearing never materialized against Berto, regardless of how many Berto uppercuts put the top of Guerrero’s head nearly between his shoulder blades.

Saturday Guerrero settled accounts with aficionados who long ago tired of his promoter and publicists. Guerrero won a fight much more than a boxing match. And for that referee Lou Moret deserves a spot of praise. That he had limited control of the fighters from the opening bell to well past the match’s closing is much the reason Saturday’s fight was much better than anticipated; Moret appeared to be from a very old school, with a founding text that instructs if a man wishes to make a million dollars fighting another man, he should not be protected from that other man if it can be helped.

An officious referee would have broken the fighters each time they locked arms, likely precluding one, if not both, Berto’s slumps to the blue canvas, and issuing another round of invitations to future athletes-cum-prizefighters to believe, as Berto does, every event of pugilism is a showcase of his athleticism in which a superior athlete’s personal injury can be attributed only to governance gone missing. After beginning the match in a crisis of identity crisis – “My Mayweather is better than Broner’s!” – Berto occasionally bodied Guerrero in rounds 3 and 4 to create separation enough to pull his right fist back towards his own chest and strike Guerrero behind the ear several times along the way, a trick that brought few complaints from Guerrero and not much of a warning from Moret. But Guerrero adjusted to it, kept his chin pressed to Berto’s collarbone while marching him backwards, and in round 5 those punches behind Guerrero’s left ear became punches to the center of Guerrero’s brainstem, a patently illegal place to put them – as Berto, Guerrero, Moret, and everyone else knew.

This gave Berto his desired opening: the referee was against him! – an inanity championed by Berto’s cheering squad on the HBO broadcast team and voiced by Berto in a postfight interview Guerrero gracelessly but gratefully interrupted to remind viewers they’d just seen neither the fight of the century nor a very even match but actually one unanimously scored 116-110 in which Robert Guerrero beat Andre Berto’s ass.

If you came to Saturday’s fight without a rooting interest, because neither guy is fractionally compelling as the heroic images force-fed to boxing fans about both – hurricane relief worker, cancer survivor spouse, victim of chemistry – you left the fight thinking much more highly of Guerrero than Berto, since Guerrero, from the very first minute, wanted to fight a hell of a lot more than Berto did, which, as Lou Moret’s inaction reminded us, is what the men signed up for, an obligation no less meaningful for the numerous instances lesser entertainers find ways round it.

Maybe it marks a change. When one considers the way Miguel Cotto was allowed to pin Floyd Mayweather to the ropes in May, the way Andre Ward was able to brutalize Chad Dawson in and out of clinches in September, the way Abner Mares obstinately purpled Anselmo Moreno’s beltline three weeks ago, and the way Guerrero was able to hold and hit Berto Saturday, one detects a possible pattern wherein the aggressor of a match is given more leeway than its superior athlete appreciates. If this is the pendulum reversing course and beginning its descent, let it swing, friends, let it swing.

Bart Barry can be reached at bart.barrys.email (at) gmail.com

Robert Guerrero may have parlayed himself into a mega payday with a twelve round unanimous decision over Andre Berto in a WBC Interim Title bout at the Citizens Business Bank Arena in Ontario, California.

In round one, Guerrero jumped on top of Berto and landed a left to the body and another left the wobbled Berto. One more left while being held up and Berto fell to the canvas for the first time in the fight. It was repeated in round two as Berto’s eye was swelling another left dropped Berto yet again. The fight then turned into phone booth fight with both fighters being warned for roughhousing on the inside. The two would stand inches from each other for most of the fight as Guerrero would not let Berto use his speed advantage at distance.

Berto started gettung it going in the middle rounds as he landed some nice double lefts that culminated with some powerful uppercuts. In round eight, both showed the effects of the hard fought contest as there was blood from both noses and the right eye of Guerrero began to swell shut. Berto made a great effort with his power punching but was too far down on the cards and needed something special down the stretch.

The two went at it tooth and nail in the twelfth but it was Guerrero who closed the show with flying colors as he landed about eight hard shots with at least half of them coming after the final bell rang.

Guerrero of Gilroy. CA won by scores of 116-111 on all cards and now looks for a possible bout with Floyd Mayweather with a record of 31-1-1. Berto of Winter Haven, FL is now 28-2.

Upstart Jr. Middleweight prospect Keith Thurman scored the most impressive win of his career as he stopped former Welterweight titlist Carlos Quintana at 2:19 of round four of their scheduled ten round bout.

Thurman was able to land a little left to the body in round one that sent Quintana to his knees for a knockdown. Thurman continued to dominate when in round four he landed a crunching left hook that buckled Quintana that set off a plethora of nasty punches that was culminated with a hard right to the head and referee Jack Reiss stopped the contest.

Thurman of Clearwater, FL is now 19-0 with eighteen knockouts. Quintana of Moca, PR is now 29-4.

Follow all the action LIVE from the Citizens Business Bank Arena in Ontario, California as WBC Interim Welterweight champion Robert Guerrero defends his crown against former two-time Welterweight champion Andre Berto. The action begins at 10pm est / 7 pm Pacific with an intriguing ten round Jr. Middleweight clash between undefeated fKeith Thurman and former world champion Carlos Quintana.

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12 ROUNDS–WBC INTERIM WELTERWEIGHT TITLE–ROBERT GUERRERO (30-1-1, 18 KO’S) VS ANDRE BERTO (28-1, 22 KO’S)

ROUND 1 Clubbing left by Berto..Right to the body..good right..Guerrero lands a body shot..left…BERTO IS HURT AND DOWN HE GOES…Straight left..10-8 Guerrero

Round 2 Straiht left…his eye is swelling…LEFT AND DOWN GOES BERTO…Good left…body shots..Right from Berto…20-16 Guerrero

Round 3 Guerrero working the body..lots of mugging on the ropes..Hard right from Berto…Guerrero lands a left over the top..30-25 Guerrero

Round 4 Berto lands a uppercut..39-35 Guerrero

Round 5 Good left from Berto..Good left to the body from Guerrero…Good body shot and uppercut from Berto..48-45 Guerrero

Round 6 Sharp right from Berto…another right…good body shot…Hard right from Berto…another right..57-55 Guerrero

Round 7 Good uppercut hurt Berto..3 good shots…Berto lands a good shot inside..2 right uppercuts..Guerrero lands a combo at the bell…Berto wobbles back to the corner..67-64 Guerrero

Round 8 Berto lands a good jab..good body shot..Both bleeding from the nose..Good body shot from Berto..76-74 Guerrero

Round 9 2 rights from Berto…left to the body and uppercut..big uppercut buckles Guerrero..85-84 Guerrero

Round 10 Guerrero’s right eye is swollen shut…Both of Berto’s eyes are swollen..Guys trading shots in close…95-94 Guerrero

Round 11 Berto lands a big right..Good body shot…hard left from Guerrero…104-104

Round 12 They are going at it in the ropes..3 hard lefts from Guerrero and 4 or 5 more after the bell…114-113 Guerrero

116-110 on all 3 cards for Robert Guerrero

10 Rounds–Jr. Middleweights–Keith Thurman (18-0, 17 KO’s) vs Carlos Quintana (29-3, 23 KO’s)

Round 1 Quintana lands a right hook…THURMAN LANDS A LEFT TO THE BODY AND DOWN GOES QUINTANA…UP AT 9…10-8 Thurman

Round 2 Thurman lands 2 hard body shots..2 straight rights20-17 Thurman

Round 3 Thurman lands a left to the body and a sharp hook inside..30-26 Thurman

Round 4Thurman lands a hard right..Vicious left hook sets off an awesome display of power punches and A CRUSHING RIGHT HAND TO THE HEAD FORCES REFEREE JACK REISS TO STOP THE FIGHT

Vyacheslav Senchenko ended the comeback of former two division world champion Ricky Hatton with a ninth round body punch stoppage in a scheduled ten round Welterweight bout In front of 20,000 adoring Hatton fans at the Manchester Arena in Manchester, England.

Hatton came out in his familiar stalking style which made Senchenko a bit uncomfortable. Senchenko used lateral movement in an effort to offset the on-charging Hatton. Hatton mixed up the assault with the body and head with lefts to the body and the right’s upstairs. Senchenko got going with straight right hands in the second. Hatton continued the pressure and was getting through with solid shots but never had Senchenko in any type of distress.

The crowd continued to urge their man on and it was working to an extent but Hatton got sloppy and started eating some right hands and body shots. In round seven, a cut formed under the left eye of Senchenko and some bad swelling started to be visible around Hatton’s right eye. The two fought a spirited eighth and Hatton started out well in round nine until a perfect left to the flank of Hatton sent him down on all fours and the referee counted ten as Hatton gasped in pain.

The bout’s sudden end came at 2:52 of round nine.

Senchenko of Ukraine is now 33-1 with twenty-two knockouts. Hatton of Manchester, UK who was making his first ring appearance in forty-two month since being flattened by Manny Pacquiao will most likely go into a second retirement with a record of 45-3

The scores at the time of the stoppage were 78-74, 77-76 and 77-76 (15rounds.com had it 77-75 for Hatton off of the television viewing)

Follow all the action live as former Jr. Welterweight and Welterweight champion Ricku Hatton returns to the ring for the first time in three years in front of his adoring fans in Manchester, England when he takes on former Welterweight titlist Vyachslav Senchenko in a ten round Welterweight bout beginning at 5pm eastern/10pm Manchester Time/Midnite Sunday in Kiev

10 ROUNDS–WELTERWEIGHTS–RICKY HATTON (45-2, 32 KO’S) VS. VYACHESLAV SENCHENKO (32-1, 21 KO’S)-

Round 1 Senchenko lands a jab..Hatton lands a right and left…Left hook..Senchenko lands a jab…trading jabs..Hatton pressuring…Hatton lands a jab.. left to the body..counter right...10-9 Hatton

Round 2 Hatton lands a right…Senchenko lands a body shot…Lead left from Hatton..nice right from Senchenko..left to body from Hatton..good counter uppercut..Lead right from Senchenko..body shot…1-2…Hatton lands a combo..Left to body from Senchenko..Body from Hatton..19-19

Round 3 Left hook to body from Hatton..jab…overhand right..big left hook..3 punch combo..Good left hook from Senchenko…Hatton lands a right…left to the body..hard left..Nice right from Senchenko..another good right...29-28 Hatton

Round 4 Hatton lands a 1-2…left hook..Senchenko lands a right…Hatton walks through it..big left hook from Hatton…right..39-37 Hatton

Round 5 Double jab from Senchenko..Right from Hatton..Straight right from Senchenko..lead left..body and left hook from Hatton..left…Senchenko lands a jab…49-46 Hatton

Round 6 Good right from Senchenko…1-2..Hatton lands a left..Left from Senchenko…jab..right..left to the bodt..left hook..Hatton lands a jab…right from Senchenko..58-56 Hatton

Round 7 Good right from Senchenko…jab…big left..left to body back up Hatton..Hatton works the body with the left…right counter from Senchenko…Both guys starting to swell under the left eye…right from Senchecnko..both get in uppercuts..Hatton lands a double left..67-66 Hatton

Round 8 Hatton working the body…right to the head..Nice combo..Senchenko lands a counter left and Straight right..right…Hatton lands a double left and jab..straight right from Senchenko..left to the body from Hatton…Right from Senchenko…body..Hatton lands a right…Senchenko lands a 1-2 at the bell…77-75 Hatton

Round 9 The two tangle up and fall to the canvas..Left from Senchenko..Straight right..Straight left from Hatton..right..left…body..LEFT TO THE BODY AND DOWN GOES HATTON AND HE IS COUNTED OUT THE FIGHT IS OVER

Four days after being shot, former three-division world champion Hector “Macho”Camacho was declared dead on Saturday morning in Puerto Rico after being taken off life support.

Camacho was shot in a drive by shooting and was shot in the face.

A man, who was with Camacho was killed at the scene and no arrests have been made as the authorities are looking for two gunmen

Camacho was 50 years old

One loss, perhaps a single punch, might be all that separates Manny Pacquiao from a full-time political career.

If – and it’s a very big if – he prevails for a fourth time against Juan Manuel Marquez on Dec. 8, however, the Filipino Congressman figures to fight two more times.

“Yes, I will continue to fight through next year,’’ Pacquiao said during a conference call a couple days before the Thanksgiving holiday.

Without any unforeseen changes in a schedule that has included one bout in spring and another in autumn, Pacquiao might be retired a year from now on a day when he can say thanks for no more questions about Floyd Mayweather Jr.

The Mayweather question was there, as it always is, during the international call. There’s not much more that Pacquiao can say. His quick response about his plans for 2013 with or without Mayweather, however, left little doubt. If victory continues to elude Marquez in a third rematch, chances at Mayweather-Pacquiao are down to two. The blueprint for boxing’s version of a fiscal cliff is there.

It looks as if Pacquiao, who already offered to take the lesser share of a 45-55 split, has two options if Mayweather finds another reason to say no. Amend that. Mayweather hasn’t said much of anything lately.

Miguel Cotto and Brandon Rios look to be the leading candidates for Pacquiao’s farewell year. Like Pacquiao, Cotto also has to win. He faces a problematic fight with Austin Trout, who could derail hopes for a rematch of his TKO loss to Pacquiao.

“Yes, there is a chance,’’ Pacquiao said of the rematch possibility with Cotto, whom he picks to beat Trout on Dec. 1 at New York’s Madison Square Garden. “I think Cotto will win the fight. Not sure if by decision or knockout. Better chance for knockout, but not sure.’’

Then, there’s Rios, whose energy and go-for-broke style in his victory over Mike Alvarado in the likely Fight of the Year moved him to the front of the line. It also would be an easy one to make. Bob Arum promotes both Rios and Pacquiao.

Another option might be there if Pacquiao-Marquez IV at Las Vegas MGM Grand ends in more controversy, which might be the best bet of all. Anybody ready for a fifth? Arum called it unlikely, yet did recall that Sugar Ray Robinson and Jake LaMotta fought six times.

“I don’t know,’’ Pacquiao said. “It’s hard to imagine a fourth one.’’

But not as hard to imagine as Pacquiao-Mayweather.

Former world champion Hector “Macho”Camacho has been declared brain dead in Puerto Rico after being shot in the face on Tuesday.

The family of Camacho are now deciding weather to take him off life support

The report said that Camacho, who had little to no brain function as of Wednesday night and all tests have been completed.

Camacho was a passenger of a car and was shot shot in the neck and jaw.

The fifty year-old Camacho was the former WBC Super Featherweight, WBC Lightweight, WBO Jr. Welterweight champion and had a record of 79-6-3.

Saturday at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City Adrien Broner fought the man aficionados asked him to fight, WBC lightweight champion Antonio DeMarco, a southpaw Tijuanense known to possess chin and heart and strength more than speed, and soundly whupped him. Broner did not flee DeMarco, clinch DeMarco or endeavor to outpoint DeMarco. Broner beat DeMarco down in a way not even the late Edwin Valero could, stopping DeMarco at 1:49 of round 8 – four minutes sooner than Valero did. It was 2012’s most important statement, for assuring Broner’s blossoming fanbase it will not look instantly foolish and Broner’s entrenched critics their assessments need adjusting.

A grim realization now settles: Adrien Broner is boxing’s foreseeable future. He is the anointed one, and unlike others prematurely blessed – Amir Khan and Victor Ortiz leap to mind, though Seth Mitchell is more timely an example – he will persuade even begrudging adults he’s deserving of what young enthusiasm now cloaks him like a sparkly pink robe, aglitter with sequins, he donned Saturday, to complement what pink gloves both fighters had to wear to show solidarity with a breast-cancer-awareness industry whose Month began Oct. 1 but now stretches past Thanksgiving*.

Broner reduced a very tough champion, a man whose garish green belt was earned as an underdog, which anymore might be the only way a belt’s merit can be trusted, to a shuffling, plodding, broken spirit. That is no criticism of Antonio DeMarco, whose tactical mistakes, time will show, were not mistakes at all – even as his supporters surely wonder why DeMarco set his chin on Broner’s right fist in the fourth round, eliminating his one advantage, height, to continually collect five flush shots in exchange for a pair of glazing ones. DeMarco went there for safety’s sake after he tasted Broner’s counter left hook and decided it was not worth suffering on his way to the table, and after he tasted Broner’s right-cross lead and decided if right hands had to be consumed, better to eat them at short range where even Broner, despite his excellent leveraging, would be unable to load them with what sauce he’d spread at full extension.

When his fans thought DeMarco was warming up, after Broner retreated to the ropes and collected left hands in round 3, DeMarco was realizing the whole enterprise faced long odds if not abject hopelessness (that would come in the fifth) and decided to get on Broner’s chest and see if luck mightn’t intervene. It sure as hell did not. Demarco accepted right uppercuts, or planned to accept them at least, in an expectation that in landing Broner would lower his fist enough to be open to a counter, or in missing thrust his right elbow far enough from his lowest rib to permit DeMarco some body work. The calculation was wrong, Broner is too conscientious of an opponent’s strengths to forget to protect himself, but flawed more because Broner’s right uppercut, now the best punch in the lightweight division, jarred DeMarco and moved him entirely off-course, forcing him to reset and put his chin back in Broner’s power alley, to try all over again.

Broner was able to take a Mexican with a granitic chin and make him think about safety by landing accurate and hard punches, and therein lies the secret to Broner’s staying power, and it is not his fast hands: Broner throws every punch hard, and he is able to throw every punch hard because he is extraordinarily well conditioned because something more than hairbrushing happens in his training camps, though confessing it might drop a gaggle of followers from the @AdrienBroner account.

The Mayweather defense, a shell of sorts Cincinnati’s Broner employs that has nothing to do with Philly, only works if the potshots that lead it are stinging blows. Anyone who’s spent time in boxing gyms since Floyd Mayweather decisioned Oscar De La Hoya – the day Mayweather replaced Roy Jones as the model for gifted athletes told they can make a fortune in boxing – has seen what devastation results if the right hand, cross or uppercut, shooting from behind the cocked left shoulder and low lead glove, fails to stun.

DeMarco did land some punches, and Broner walked through them. That’s important because it goes to what makes Broner, if not enticing, at least palatable to serious persons who are otherwise seriously repulsed by his shtick, one informed by a philosophy Broner annunciated in an interview with Larry Merchant, an octogenarian who wrote well about our sport before Broner’s father was born, to whom Broner explained the problem with contemporary prizefighting is that most of its fighters are “just boxing” – which likely came as a revelation to Merchant and other aficionados who foolishly contend the problem with prizefighting is that its practitioners aren’t “just boxing” fractionally often as their predecessors did.

Now there will be other supposedly tough opponents proposed for Broner by well-intentioned and hopeful folks desperate to avert another five years like the last five, when prizefighting’s best talent named himself “Money” then acted accordingly, but it’s of no use. Broner can clean out the lightweight division if he so chooses or go to 140 pounds and do the same – though fans are forgiven their transaction fees this week if they transfer the remaining balance of their DeMarco investment into a Brandon Rios account.

Those of us bound to be dragged dustily behind the Broner bandwagon have a single request that oughtn’t be too unbearable but likely will be: Make the fights, three a year, people ask of you, Adrien; for the longterm health of the sport and your place in its annals, remove the most important fights from hypothetical’s seductively painless grasp, as you did Saturday. Do that, and in time you’ll surpass Mayweather.

*Readers interested in the troublesome implications of having such an industry are encouraged to view “Pink Ribbons, Inc.”

Bart Barry can be reached at bart.barrys.email (at) gmail.com

Only a few weeks after Superstorm Sandy hit Atlantic City, a new storm will make landfall. Adrien Broner and Antonio Demarco are both expecting to inflict damage tonight at the Boardwalk Hall. DeMarco has his WBC lightweight title on the line for this bout scheduled for twelve rounds.

“I am very excited to fight in Atlantic City. I was on my toes when Sandy came through, but even Sandy couldn’t stop this fight from going on, so it must have been meant to be,” said Broner this week. Broner is considered by many to be the best young fighter in boxing, but he has yet to face an opponent that poses a legitimate threat. But Antonio DeMarco is more than just an opponent and more than just a threat. He brings with him a world title, thirty one professional bouts, and experience against undefeated opposition. To top it off, he is in his prime years at the age of twenty-six.

And Broner fully understands what DeMarco is capable of, saying, “DeMarco is definitely my best opponent so far on paper. [He] has fought good guys, but he hasn’t fought me. You are going to see a totally different Adrien Broner on Saturday night.”

“I’ve faced undefeated boxers in the past and I have learned my lessons. I’m coming into the fight ready. I’ve been defeated in the past and that experience has helped me to be ready to succeed this time,” stated DeMarco. He has faced young opposition as the underdog multiple times in the past. He won most and even in losing, was never out classed.

“I’m confident that my training will pay off. I can assure you that we will put on a good show. May the best boxer win,” added DeMarco.

Indeed.

Tonight’s fight takes place at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, New Jersey. The event is promoted by Golden Boy Promotions and R & R Promotions in association with Gary Shaw Productions, sponsored by Caesars Atlantic City, Corona and AT&T and will be televised live on HBO World Championship Boxing beginning at 10:00 p.m. ET/PT. The co-main event will be a 12-round heavyweight clash between Seth “Mayhem” Mitchell and Johnathon Banks for Mitchell’s NABO title and the vacant WBC International Heavyweight title.

Scotty Cardle pounded out an eight round decision over Miguel Aguilar in a Jr. Welterweight bout.

Cardle won by an 80-70 score and is now 8-0. Aguilar of Barcelona, Spain is 10-5.

Khalid Yafai scored a fifty-two second stoppage over Pio Antonio Nettuno in a scheduled eight round Super Bantaweight bout.

Yafai is now 5-0 with four knockouts. Nettuno is 7-6

In the main event of Friday’s SHOWTIME-televised ShoBox: The New Generation live from Gulfstream Park in Hallandale Beach, FL, undefeated lightweight contender Angelo “La Cobra” Santana (14-0, 11 KOs), devastated previously unbeaten Johnny Garcia (13-1,8 KOs) with a sensational knockout in the fifth round that left Garcia out cold on the canvas. Santana started a little slow while accepting a fair challenge from Garcia, who was able to touch the former two-time national Cuban champion very early. That changed in the second round when Santanas speed became a deciding factor, as he hurt and leveled the Holland, Mich. product with speed and power. Garcia was able to beat the count and made it through the next couple rounds, but was cut and slowly being broken down by big body shots and blistering fast counter punches. Santana delivered an incredible straight left hand from his southpaw stance in round 5 that knocked Garcia out cold before he hit the canvas. The fight was immediately called, no count necessary. “I was able to knock him [Johnny Garcia] out and that was my intention. He was a very strong opponent but I was able to stop him.” Santana quoted. “This performance says it all for me. This proves I am ready. “I felt nervous at the beginning as this was my first national TV appearance. I needed a round to gain my composure. But I was in front of my people and they supported me and that is something beautiful. “I was waiting for him to gain confidence and attack me because he was the taller fighter. Once he did that I was able to unload my left hand. I came looking for my fight and he was the one who hurried up.”

In the Co-Main Event super welterweights featuring world-ranked Miami favorite Joey “Twinkle Fingers” Hernandez (23-1-1, 13 KOs), an American-born Cuban, won a hard fought unanimous decision over James “Shotgun” Winchester (15-6, 5 KOs), from Greensboro, N.C. Hernandez, 28, has won seven consecutive fights and is currently ranked No. 12 by the World Boxing Council and the International Boxing Federation. He’s the No. 13 rated 154-pounder in the World Boxing Organization. Joey Hernandez said “He [James Winchester] was a little awkward. He led with his head a lot. I did what I had to do and now it’s on to bigger and better things. “He was a tough guy, gave me good rounds. I would have liked to have thrown more combinations but I was being mindful of being headbutted. James Winchester: “I think I won the fight. He [Joey Hernandez] stepped on my foot when I fell and kept hitting me behind the head. “But you know what? It’s cool. This is his hometown crowd and now this crowd respects me.”

In the opening bout of the evening Heavyweight Trevor “The American Dream” Bryan 5-0(4KO) made easy work with a third round TKO win over Hassan Lee 4-3. Bryan dropped Lee midway through the first round with a big left hook, where Lee was able to survive the round that it was obvious the end was near. Lee scored another knockdown in round two and the end came in round three after a huge right hand promoted referee Frank Gentile to step in and stop the fight at 1:45. After the fight Bryan said “I told everyone my jab is my strongest punch. I pumped it up with my double jab and I set my man up.” “I had him [Hassan Lee] in the first round but I need to listen to my corner more. I needed to pick up my punch count and improve my defense. I’m the ‘American Dream.’ I’m ready to go.”

Oleg Platov 30-1 (24KO) scored a knockout over Harold Sconiers 18-26 with a huge left hook at 1 minute 46 seconds of the second round. The Ukrainian Platov started fast against Hardroc landing a series of left hooks onto the durable chin of Sconiers. Sconiers caught Platov in the first round and opened a cut over the left eye of the Ukrainian. Just as the fight seemed as if it just may get interesting, Platove twisted into a left hook that sent Sconiers to the canvas for the ten count. Platov looked strong in his first fight in over two years. After the fight Platov said, “It was great to be back after two years. I had promotional problems but that is over now and I thank Don King for becoming my new promoter. It was beautiful to fight outdoors in Florida. Harold Sconiers was good tonight. We had an accidental clash of head that caused the gash outside my left eye. But he gave me good work. My coach told me between the first and second round that I should throw the uppercut. I was throwing too wide. I threw the uppercut in the second round and my opponent walked right into it. It was great to come back with a knockout. Tell everyone Oleg Platov is back.”

Light Welterweights Amir Iman 6-0(5KO) and Tony “Sugar Boy” Walker 5-2(3KO) engaged in a very entertaining and exciting brawl that lasted just two rounds. Walker gave Iman a tough fight while taking big shots from the young prospect. Walker was hurt midway through round number two and Iman pressured his weakened opponent until Sam Burgoes wisely stepped in and saved Walker from any further punishment. The official time was 2:50 of round 2. TKO. “He [Tony Walker] was a tough opponent, no sucker. I out-toughed him and out-skilled him. I got the stoppage and that’s all that matters. “I have superior skills and techniques that most other fighters don’t have. I’m old school. I study the old masters like Joe Gans from the 1800s. He was an old master and that’s why they call me the ‘Young Master.’

Two little guys, who could step on a scale together and weigh nearly 25 pounds less than Wladimir Klitschko, are getting some heavyweight attention for a bid to win a couple of pieces of the flyweight title. The unification label has been attached to the Brian Viloria-Tyson Marquez bout Saturday at the Los Angeles Sports Arena (WealthTV & wealthtv.com at 9pm est)

In a fractured business full of more acronyms than the federal government, however, unification and boxing are an odd couple. A little bit like jumbo shrimp. From I to W with a B in between, titles are as irrelevant they’ve ever been. But there is something significant about Viloria-Marquez. It’s about a legend and tying it to a fight that could revive the fortunes of the best among the little big men. If there is link between yesterday and today, it’s a piece of unity worth fighting for.

For nearly two decades, Michael Carbajal-Humberto Gonzalez has been the standard for what the smallest divisions have hoped to become, yet never have. In the first of their three fights at junior-flyweight, Carbajal and Gonzalez put the Lord into the Flies in March 1993 at the Las Vegas Hilton. Carbajal, down twice and seemingly finished in the fifth round, stormed back in the seventh with a paralyzing uppercut followed by a left that dropped Gonzalez onto his back like a piece of discarded plywood.

It was a fight that led to million-dollar purses for Carbajal and Gonzalez. Then, it seemed to herald a rich new age for fighters who campaigned at weights between 106 and 112 pounds. But it didn’t happen. Carbajal and Gonzalez couldn’t pull off an encore in two rematches, both won in 1994 by Gonzalez in decisions as narrow as they were forgettable.

In subsequent years, there was never anything that could quite live up to that one dynamic fight. Many of today’s greats started at the low end of the weight and pay scale. There’s Manny Pacquiao and Nonito Donaire and Jorge Arce. Arce is a constant reminder of just how good Carbajal was. In 1999 and years past his prime, a bloodied and seemingly-beaten Carbajal knocked out a young Arce with a lightning bolt of a right hand in a stunning 11th-round in Tijuana.

But Pacquiao, Donaire and Arce have moved up and on in pursuit of bigger checks. They won’t be remembered as flyweights. But Viloria and perhaps Marquez will be. That gives them a chance at a re-enactment of the 1993 classic, which has stood alone for so long the memory of it has begun to fade. It’s good history only if there’s a reason to remember it. Maybe, Viloria-Marquez on Wealth TV is that reason to hope history repeats itself.

Viloria, a 2000 Olympian, began his career more than a decade. For a while, he and Arce appeared to be moving toward a bout that Bob Arum thought might be a Carbajal-Gonzalez encore. But Viloria’s career got sidetracked by inconsistency so troublesome that it might be a problem against Marquez.

Meanwhile, Marquez is powerful and not as inexperienced as some might argue. His resume includes a loss to Donaire, a pound-for-pound contender. In a close bout and potential Fight of the Year, the decisive factor might be age. At 24, Marquez is seven year younger than Viloria. Flyweights have a shorter lifespan than fighter in the heavier divisions. At 31, Viloria looks to be a lot closer to the end than he is to his prime. But he’s won five straight fights, including an impressive stoppage of Giovani Sequra, whose looks and style remind some of Carbajal. Maybe, Viloria is a late bloomer.

Carbajal, now 45 and living in Phoenix, doesn’t know who to pick. He’s watched Viloria throughout his erratic career. He knows about Marquez, yet hasn’t had a chance to see him often enough to really judge him.

“But they’ve both got power,’’ Carbajal said. “I’m not sure about Viloria’s age. That could be trouble. We’ll see. But whoever takes a shot better, will win.’’

Sounds like it could be classic. That’s exactly what determined the 1993 fight. Carbajal absorbed and endured Gonzalez’ power. Then, he delivered some of his own in an epic still searching for an encore.

15rounds.com is giving away a pair of tickets to this Saturday’s Brian Viloria – Hernan Marquez WBA/WBO Flyweight unification bout in Los Angeles. All you have to do is leave a prediction in the comments section of this post to be eligible and we will pick the winner Tomorrow–NOTE WE ARE JUST PROVIDING THE TICKETS, SO PEOPLE SHOULD BE IN DRIVING DISTANCE OF LOS ANEGLES